This invention relates generally to clothing for nursing mothers to facilitate convenient nursing of their babies.
Such clothing has long been known in the prior art such as, for example, the nursing waist disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,013,778 issued to J. Jacoby on Jan. 2, 1912, the nursing gown disclosed in 778,014 issued to R. T. Coyle on Dec. 20, 1904, and the nursing dress disclosed in 232,246 and issued to M. Duenckel on Sept. 14, 1880. While these prior art articles of clothing are all intended to facilitate nursing, they are each a primary article of clothing in and of themselves. They are not intended as supplemental articles of clothing to be worn over or under a primary article of clothing and, indeed, could not readily be worn in such a way.
Furthermore, because these prior art garments are primary articles of clothing, they do not permit the nursing mother a wide choice in the selection of her wearing apparel. For example, these garments can not be worn as supplemental articles of clothing along with sweaters, blouses, shirts, jackets, vests or other primary and conventional garments which the nursing mother might choose to wear from time to time. In other words, she would be essentially restricted to the wearing of these specialized prior art garments throughout her period of nursing and could not enjoy the flexibility of dressing in a variety of conventional clothing as can other women not involved in the nursing of infants.
My invention substantially overcomes these and other prior art difficulties.